


Freud Would Have a Heyday

by ADeedWithoutaName



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Gen, Humor, implied wincest, outsider pov
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-10-11
Updated: 2019-10-11
Packaged: 2020-12-09 11:38:21
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,009
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20994197
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ADeedWithoutaName/pseuds/ADeedWithoutaName
Summary: Castiel sees a therapist. It goes about as well as you'd expect.





	Freud Would Have a Heyday

"Alan, your three o'clock's here."

I grit my teeth around a mouthful of scotch. If I had a dollar for every time I've told Marci to call me Dr. Bell out where the patients can hear her, I'd probably have enough to retire right now. Or at least pay the Escalade off.

"All right, Marci, thank you. I should be ready for him in just a minute or two, go ahead and send him back then."

I bolt the rest of the scotch, which is a damn shame. There was less than a finger left, but it was a good year, and a Christmas present. Not to mention my Friday afternoon treat. The patient's right on time, it's me who was running late, but I'm very tempted to blame him anyway.

I put the scotch back on the sideboard, sitting amber in its decanter, and the glass, too. The picture of my wife and I in the Maldives goes back up prominently on my desk, and I re-don my wedding band, along with my glasses. The timer, as always, gets set to forty-five minutes. Grabbing a very thin file, a fresh legal pad, and a pen, I settle into my chair, arrange a reassuring smile on my face. I can just barely feel the scotch, a burr in my veins. Hopefully it'll make this session smooth.

The patient comes in maybe half a second after everything's ready.

He takes stock of my office. No cursory glances for this guy, his eyes land on everything. The degrees on the wall, the abstract artwork, the heavy, leather-bound books in their solid cases. The scotch. The carpet's forest green, all the furniture dark wood.

There's a couch, yes, but not leather. I'd like to think I'm not that much of a stereotype.

I'm looking at him while he's examining my space. Late thirties, early forties. Tall, just a hair shy of six feet and, based on how he looks, fresh off a ten-hour flight with lots of turbulence. His trench coat and suit are rumpled, tie even hanging backwards, his black hair's a mess, and the scruff on his jaw straddles the line between "rugged" and "homeless." He didn't tell Marci why he wanted to come in, so I scratch a couple possibles on my pad. _Depression. Insomnia._

Despite all that, he's attractive. Objectively, I mean. The average woman wouldn't find him bad-looking. Especially with the brightest set of blue eyes I've ever seen, sunlight shafting through a glacier.

"I'm guessing you're Castiel Shurley." I greet him warmly.

He starts at the name, looking at me so fast it has to hurt his neck.

"Sorry," I apologize. "Am I not saying that right?"

"No, you are." What a _voice_. Like he eats gravel and nicotine for breakfast. He looks mad, mutters something to himself I barely catch: "I'm going to burn my name into his car as soon as I get home."

I feel my eyebrow rise, make another note on the pad. _Anger issues._

"Castiel's quite a mouthful," I comment. Wryly, I think the name alone could be at the root of a hundred appointments' worth of issues. "Do you like to be called Cas?"

"I do, but not by you." He must see the surprise on my face, though it takes him a few seconds to respond to it. "I'm sorry. Castiel is fine."

_Asperger's?_ I write, then invite him to have a seat. You can tell a lot about a patient by whether they take the couch or the armchair.

Castiel does neither. There's a small table by one of my windows, more decorative than functional, and Castiel grabs its chair and puts it in front of me, unnervingly close. Then he _perches _on it. Toes on the floor, heels against the legs, sitting on the very edge of the seat like he's trying to keep an invisible rucksack off the back. I make a note of how uncomfortable he is in the room, in his own skin. Probably some kind of sensory processing disorder.

We stare at each other. Sometimes the best tool in my arsenal is silence. People will do anything to fill it.

As we run up on twenty or thirty seconds, I realize that that method's not going to work with Castiel. He's got his head cocked, frowning, studying me with eyes that are practically backlit. I open his file, which doesn't really have anything in it but his name and insurance information, but doing that looks official.

"So. What brings you in today, Castiel?"

"My…friend suggested that I come and talk to someone like you," he begins. "Which is hypocritical of him, since he could probably benefit a lot more from talk therapy himself. But I'd like to set an example. Serve as a positive role model. His brother feels the same way."

I'm nodding encouragingly, about to talk when he keeps going.

"You know, relatively speaking, this is a very new innovation," he comments, eyes going to my degrees again. "There were equivalent practices in the ancient world, of course, but for the most part, the mentally ill were viewed as prophets or demons with nothing in between. The traumatized were largely ignored." He pauses. "I'd say those were more elegant times. But, really, they weren't."

"We definitely don't ignore people anymore," I assure him. "Or, say, lobotomize them." I smile. He just cocks his head again. "How about we go back to the friend who convinced you to come in. Is this a close friend?"

All of a sudden, Castiel's showing the most emotion I've seen from him so far. "We've been through a lot together. He's forgiven me for…so much, and we live together. He's told me that I'm like a brother to him, but." He frowns, laces his fingers together. "I'm not sure I'm comfortable with that. Considering the relationship he has with his brother."

I lean forward. "Do you think 'brothers' might not be intimate enough for you, Castiel?"

"Oh, no, it's the exact opposite. He and his brother are soulmates."

"So you mean they're…very close," I venture.

"Extremely," he states, nodding.

There's a pause as I weigh how deep to go, since this is our first session, trying to suss out what might offend him. I go for it after a moment.

"Do you think there might be anything strange going on between your friends?"

"Oh, no, of course not," he assures immediately. "They haven't consummated their relationship yet."

That "yet" hangs heavy and twisted over the two of us. Castiel appears to realize he shouldn't have said that, but makes no move to correct what he said. I take us forward, nothing else to do.

"Do you feel threatened at all by their…" I clear my throat. "Closeness?"

He looks puzzled. His head goes to the other side. "Of course not. I couldn't be personally threatened by that any more than I could…continental drift, or a supernova."

"And what do you mean by that, exactly?"

"That they're soulmates. It's God's will and has been since the beginning, their names are written on each other's hearts. It's an inevitability."

I decide to return to these brothers and whatever the hell's going on with them later. After all, how important can their relationship be?

"'Their names are written on each other's hearts,'" I repeat, slowly. "That's a beautiful sentiment, Castiel."

"Oh, it's not a sentiment," he assures. "It's a fact."

I nod and try to take that in stride for now. "So…does everybody have a name on their heart?"

"Yes. Almost everyone." He's staring at my chest, intently, and for half a second, I feel like I'm getting an X-ray, somebody peeking at parts of me that have never seen the light of day. Then he frowns. "Who's Mark?"

If I hadn't had years of practice, I'd probably have some sort of outburst at that. As it is, I've still got a hard time tamping down my reaction, and I can feel a faint wash of a blush prickling on my cheeks.

Before I can say anything, he sees something in my expression that makes him back off. "I see. He's your Sam…although I don't think he's your brother." A pause. "I'm sorry."

I'll be damned if I'm even going to try and parse that. Let's just get out of here. "Whose…name do you think might be on your heart, Castiel?"

"Nobody's."

"Why do you think that?"

"I don't have a heart."

I write that down. It grounds me. "Why do you feel that way?"

He's confused again. Leaning forward, his gravelly voice sounds concerned when he tells me, "Dr. Bell. I'm not sure you understand what I am."

I'm back on even footing now, blush and hammering heart gone. I settle back in my chair and steeple my fingers, examining Castiel through my glasses.

"Well, let's start from the beginning, then." I smirk, then playfully add, "Tell me about your mother."

The joke flies miles over his head. I underline _Asperger's _on my pad.

"I don't have one."

"You never knew her?"

"No. I just…don't have a mother."

He states it with the solid, concrete conviction of a young child parroting a parent's words, and I start to wonder if maybe he shouldn't have a legal guardian or caretaker here with him. Maybe that's what these "brothers" are he keeps mentioning.

"How about your father, then?"

"I didn't meet him until very late in life," Castiel admits. "Before then, I obeyed every command that came to me, and held him in the highest reverence. Just like everyone else. But my opinion began to…change, and sour, when I learned to think for myself. Around the time I met my friends." He looks at me. "You see, I'd been assigned to see that they followed the scripts my father had written for them, back in the beginning. It wasn't until I spent time with them, began to see them as their own beings rather than pieces on a chessboard or characters in a narrative, that I realized how pretentious and cruel it really is. To take away someone's choice, force such a devastating, tragic role upon them." He smiles then, almost laughs. "But that's my father."

I can't help feeling like I'm missing roughly a library's worth of context here.

I'm quiet for a moment, cobbling together the pieces I've been given into a shape I can understand. Tentatively, I try, "So your friends are…actors, then."

"No, of course not." Castiel chuckles. "Although there actually is a very amusing story, about an adjacent reality and their alternate selves that I could…"

I've started squinting at him without realizing it, mouth slightly open. He must see that, because he cuts himself off and sobers.

"Maybe another time." He clears his throat, continues. "My friends were essentially bred and trained for my brothers, for them to enter. But none of that really matters anymore."

He waves a hand dismissively, and the gesture is so obviously, consciously practiced that it looks more awkward than no gesture at all.

I can feel my control slipping, my comprehension dropping by the second. It's been a long time since I sat in session with a patient and had _no fucking idea _what they were talking about. I'm fully aware that might be his goal here, confusing me, shocking me, making me feel like an idiot, and I'm not going to give him what he wants. There has to be something to salvage here.

"…your brothers," I repeat. "So. You've got siblings, then?"

"Oh, thousands," Castiel agrees, "but most of them are dead." There's a pause, then his shoulders slump, and that isn't artificial. "I…killed most of them, actually. That's probably one of the things we should discuss."

That's it. I put a hand out to shut him up, then pull out my best "stern father" look. I've got a hunch it'll work wonders on him.

"Castiel, there's something you need to understand here," I state flatly. "I can't help you at all unless you are completely, fully, one hundred percent honest with me. So can you do that, or not?"

He seems taken aback, but then he's nodding his understanding. "I'm sorry, Doctor. I should have started when I came in."

Castiel sits up straight, squares his shoulders, and I could swear I hear a rustling. Then the room feels suddenly…crowded, as if nearly all the space is filled. I resist the urge to sink back in my chair.

"My name is Castiel. And I'm an angel of the Lord."

Castiel elaborates as I stare at him. "A seraph, to be specific. Uh, an energy being of pure light, and the vessel I'm in is named Jimmy Novak." He frowns. "He could probably stand to talk to you, too."

I can tell, from the same steadfast earnestness that's marked out every single other thing he says, that he thinks he's telling the truth.

_That's what you get when you name your kid something like Castiel_, I think snidely to myself, but I maintain my professional demeanor as I start thinking about seventy-two-hour holds, contacting loved ones, transferring what few patient files I have to the nearest hospital or long-term care facility. I shut that down. I'm getting way ahead of myself.

"I'm going to have to ask you a few questions," I say.

"I understand." Castiel agrees immediately.

"Do you hear voices?"

"Of course. Constantly. Though not nearly as many, since…" Castiel sighs. "I've lost so many of my brothers…I can usually tune out what remains."

I make a note.

"Do you see things other people don't?"

"Again. Of course. I'm an angel, I exist on a different plane, as do many other things."

"Can you describe what you see?"

"Ghosts, mostly. Reapers, souls, other beings…" He nods at my chest, brow furrowed. "How humans have been marked."

I could probably answer this next one all on my own, but I ask anyway. "Do you feel like you have difficulty expressing yourself? Your emotions? Have other people told you that you have a flat affect, or…a lack of facial expressions?"

"Absolutely." Castiel shakes his head. "I don't exactly experience emotions like a human, although my range has widened exponentially in a few years. So of course I have difficulty expressing them. And almost everyone's told me I come across as emotionless." He squints. "That is what 'having a stick up my ass' means, right?"

"Can you tell me how long all of this has been going on?"

"My…entire life," Castiel says slowly. "Of course. All four-and-a-half billion years of it. I was created as I am now…give or take. I didn't grow into my powers or anything." He smiles all of a sudden. "You know, Dr. Bell, I have to say that I'm impressed by you. Most people don't believe me, or they get afraid, angry. You seem to be taking all this in stride. I knew it was a good idea to come to you."

Delusions, hallucinations, difficulty feeling or expressing emotions. That's three when I technically only need two for a diagnosis.

I'm feeling a little out of my league. Usually, all I have are soccer moms lying about creepy uncles to get Valium scrips renewed. Frustrated middle-management with runaway Oedipus complexes. Maybe the occasional textbook gifted child who just hit high school and needs a truckload of Prozac. Hardly ever anything like this. Can I even handle it?

Of course I can. I welcome the challenge with open arms.

I steel myself. It's going to be a difficult diagnosis because, just from talking to Castiel for however long it's been, I can tell he's got at least two comorbid conditions. I set my pad aside and pull my cell out, typing in 911 just in case. Castiel's looking at me, I can feel it.

"Why did you do that?" He's not accusing, just confused. I don't answer him.

"Castiel," I start, as kindly as I possibly can, "you very obviously have a very severe form of psychosis. Almost certainly schizophrenia."

His lips are slightly parted, he's just about got me skewered on those eyes of his. They could pull you in from across a bar. If you were a woman.

"I don't have anything like that." Same earnestness as everything else. "I'm not even capable of it."

"You do, and you are," I tell him firmly. "But you don't have to be afraid. Lots of people out there are living totally normal lives with schizophrenia diagnoses. We do have to be careful with our next steps, though." I lean in. "I'd like to admit you to an inpatient program, just temporarily. You'll undergo a much more complete evaluation there, and they can start getting your symptoms under control."

"I've spent time someplace like that before," Castiel starts, guarded, "when I needed it. But I don't at the moment. All I need right now is to talk about my problems, which is why I came to you. Why I was referred to you. Instead of trying to contact the woman…demon, actually…who gave me such excellent care last time." He comes up short, and there's grief in his voice when he continues. "And she's dead, too, isn't she? Great."

At this point, I take all that in stride. "It might be easier if your family's involved in the treatment process. Do you know how I could contact your father?"

"That's impossible," Castiel says flatly. "I've tried many, many times before myself."

"How about the brothers you mentioned earlier?" I don't believe he actually has any siblings, but it's worth a try. "The ones meant to…enter your friends."

"Also impossible. And a terrible, terrible idea."

"Okay. We can revisit that later." I reach for my scrip pad, sitting on my desk. "If nothing else, I'd really like to get you on some medication that should make you feel a lot better. It's called haloperidol, you might know it as Haldol. It's been around a long, long time and it's kind of a stopgap measure, usually, but since your case is so extreme…"

He stands before I can get my hand on the pad. I don't actually see him get up, he's just suddenly – standing. There's more rustling, and a light coming from somewhere, oddly enough, I can't identify. The office feels immensely crowded again, so full there's pressure on my eyes and eardrums. I swallow, but that doesn't do any good.

"You don't understand." Castiel sounds regretful about that. "I can't blame you. Let me demonstrate in order to convince you."

I fumble with my phone as he approaches. It's not dialing, though, and when I look at it, there's no number typed in. My thumb must have slipped and cleared it.

I type the three numbers in again with hands that have suddenly started to shake. The man across from me is tall, boxy and broad-shouldered, but beyond that, I know logically that he's just a patient. Just a sick man. I've still got this feeling, though. That something ancient and eldritch and terrible is rapidly closing the distance between the two of us.

A being of light, but the kind of light that scorches the flesh from bones it then withers and blackens. A volcanic eruption. The birth of a star. All folded into meat that should be too fragile to contain it.

Beeping shatters the silence before Castiel can reach me or I can get the cops on the line. It startles him into stopping and me into dropping my phone. I go numbly to pick it up, realize I'm hearing the kitchen timer on my desk.

"Does that mean our time's up?" Castiel asks.

I look at him, and he's…just a person. Tired-looking and mussed. The pressure and feeling of fullness in the room are gone, everything's gone, and he doesn't move. So I nod and, jittery, turn off the timer.

Castiel seems to be mulling something over. After a moment, he says, "Everything considered, I actually feel much better just from talking about what little we were able to get to." He smiles. "I suppose therapy really does work. I'd very much like to make this a regular thing…should I come in again at the same time next week? That is how this works, right?"

I'm stuttering out an answer when he talks over me, continuing. "In fact, I think I'd like the rest of my family to come." He looks at me ruefully. "My real family. Not the one my father set me into. The friends I mentioned, Sam and Dean. Maybe you could help them move past the barriers in their relationship. They exist for a reason when it comes to most people, but for them, it's…doing more harm than good."

"I usually don't – " I start weakly, but I'm not sure Castiel is even listening.

"Oh, and our son. Jack. He has quite a bit he should probably try to work through. He just recently lost his biological father, in fact. He does have three others remaining and that particular one was…well, Lucifer, but that doesn't mean it wasn't a devastating blow."

I might as well be standing a foot under the ocean's surface, drowning in what Castiel thinks is real. I have to hand it to him, though: his delusions are so rich, so vividly detailed. Not to mention consistent.

You could probably write a book on them. Maybe even a whole TV show.

For me, there might at least be a paper in it. That thought perks me up some.

"Our insurance is, of course, fraudulent," Castiel goes on apologetically, "so I doubt it will ever pay out. But maybe we could repay you in…other ways." I'm flushing hot, but he's oblivious, looking around with a thoughtful eye like he's seeing past the walls of my office. "This building is heavily haunted. Getting rid of the ghosts may improve a lot of things."

I'm sucking in a breath to try and cut him off when he looks at the timer again, winces. "But I really shouldn't take up any more of your time. I'll be going."

Against every ounce of better judgement in me, I make a snap decision. I can't let him go when he's so deep in the grip of his illness. Not in good conscience as a therapist. I know he's leaving any second, and I lunge between him the entrance to my office even as he's cheerfully telling me he'll see me next week. I'll do whatever it takes to keep him from walking out that door.

He doesn't use the door.

A sound like somebody shaking out a huge bedsheet, and then I'm alone in the office with an odd smell. It's like lightning, then another primordial, wild thing, like untouched forest or clean ocean, all edged with something sweet and crisp. Something about it nearly makes me hungry.

My shock keeps me company, too. So extreme it feels like I'm numb an inch deep all over my body.

Almost mechanically, I do a circle, checking the office even though I know it's totally useless. The windows are still closed and locked, the door hasn't been touched, everywhere else a man that size could've darted off to is empty, empty, empty. I expect it to make me feel better but somehow, it really doesn't.

I'm unsteady when I'm done. Part of me thinks that I should drop back into my chair. Instead, I head to my desk, twisting off the platinum band on my left ring finger almost as an afterthought.

I'm going to tell Marci to cancel the rest of my appointments for the evening. There aren't that many, and no emergencies. Then I'll have her call my wife and tell her I'll be working late at the office.

And _then _I'll call Mark. See if he doesn't want to grab a drink. Or ten.

Probably scotch.


End file.
